Examination of critical thinking skills of middle school students according to some demographic characteristics

The aim of this study is to contribute to the literature by examining the critical thinking skills of middle school students in terms of various variables in the demographic field, based on the results determined. The screening model, which is one of the quantitative research models, was used to answer the questions of the research and test its hypotheses. The answers given to the questionnaire, which was prepared to measure the critical thinking skills of the students, were investigated whether there was a relationship based on gender, parental education level, grade level, school types and critical thinking skill levels. The universe of the research is Antalya, while the sample is composed of Aksu, Döşemealtı, Kepez, Konyaaltı and Muratpaşa, which are the central districts of Antalya. A "critical thinking skill test" was applied to a total of 416 students in the 5th, 6th and 7th grades in eight schools, five randomly determined, and three private schools. Dr. Lecturer. Member of Eray Eğmir's "Development of a Success Test for Measuring Critical Thinking Skill" study and KR-20, KR-21 values were 0.61 to 0.63 difficulty index of 0.37 and discrimination index was 0, respectively. It was taken from the 25-item measuring tool with 32 items. From this measurement tool, 15 items were used considering the universe and sampling characteristics. SSPS 21.0 was used to analyze the data and independent t-test and single factor variance analysis (ANOVA) were used as statistical techniques. As a result of the research, it was observed that there was a significant difference in terms of the students' gender, class levels, and parental education levels, but there was no significant difference in public school-private school comparisons.